There is a saying thrown about loosely today that somebody should adopt the latest “societal movement” invented in the last five minutes because you do not want to end up on “the wrong side of history.” The idea is that history, usually written by the people with biases sympathetic to those social changes, will cast a negative verdict on you for standing in its way.
1 Samuel 14 ends with an interesting verdict on Saul’s reign. Despite Saul’s blatant folly and his lack of faithfulness to God and God’s commands, the text issues a positive verdict from history. Yet there is only one verdict which truly matters; God’s. This passage reminds us not to be too focused on the present day’s historical verdict, because the ultimate verdict of history will be issued by God.
1 Samuel 13 and 14 paint Saul in a less than flattering light. Saul was impatient to wait on God and his appointed messenger, Samuel, and so showed his lack of faithfulness to God and the covenant between God and his people by unlawfully sacrificing an animal. Saul was more concerned with the deserting army than with obedience to God. Saul ended up losing God’s favour, and losing his family line’s claim to Israel’s throne.
Then in chapter 14, Saul’s son Jonathan effectively shows up Saul by modelling the trust and dependence on God that comes from a living faith. Through Jonathan, God defeated the Philistines and caused a great victory. But Saul’s foolish vows and acts did his best to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory, and led to his authority being undermined among the people.
By the standards of God, Saul was a failure. He failed to lead the people toward God. He failed to show trust and reliance on God. He failed to obey and listen to God.
And yet, verses 47 to 52 offer a different assessment of Saul. Saul is described as fighting enemies on all sides, and “Wherever he turned he routed them” (v.47). Where the previous verses talked of Saul as a fool, who sat on his hands waiting for a sign rather than trusting God and going forth, here the passage states “he did valiantly and struck the Amalekites and delivered Israel out of the hands of those who plundered them” (v.48).
This is a very different verdict to the previous verses. Surprisingly so, even. This is the verdict of history, which looks back with rose-tinted glasses and sees Saul as the king when Israel finally began throwing off many of the enemies who had caused them trouble for hundreds of years. A good military man.
Nor was Saul’s homelife a wreck, according to history. Saul had three sons, Jonathan, Ishvi, and Malchi-shua; and two daughters, Merab and Michal (v.49). He had a wife, “Ahinoam the daughter of Ahimaaz” (v.50). His uncle, Abner, commanded his army (vv.50-51). Saul did not leave a trail of broken marriages and abandoned children. By history’s measure, he was a good family man.
While verses 45 and 46 would suggest that Saul was fatally undermined by his threat to kill Jonathan for unknowingly violating a vow, the verdict of history said otherwise. “There was hard fighting against the Philistines all the days of Saul. And when Saul saw any strong man, or any valiant man, he attached him to himself” (v.52).
There were plenty of fights against the Philistines, and Saul built a military force of valiant men to follow him. He was an expert recruiter. He built the administrative core needed to transition Israel to a kingship-led state. He was a good institutional man.
But where was God in all of this? Where was the evidence of his piety or of his service of God? Where is the evidence of his faithful worship of God? None of this is mentioned. It stands absent in the verdict of history.
The truth is, Saul was on the wrong side of God. He may have done things which from a worldly and historical perspective were successful, but from the eternal perspective were they really of value?
The truth is, they were not. Not for Saul, and not for us either. As Jesus said, “what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul?” (v.36). We may be on “the right side of history” for a time, as Saul was, but if it is not accompanied by a saving relationship with God, we are on the wrong side of God, and that is for eternity.
History can only look on the outside, it cannot judge the secrets of the heart of men. Only God can do that. Ultimately, it is what is on the inside that counts, not the outside.
Saul was a good institutional man, a good family man, and a good military man. He accomplished much which is worthy of respect. But he failed in the most important thing. He failed to trust and obey God.
Better to be on the right side of God, than the right side of history.
